


Without Words

by LittleSpider



Category: Avengers, Avengers Assemble, Clintasha - Fandom, MCU, Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, avengers MCU
Genre: ASL, American Sign Language, Angst, Clintasha - Freeform, Deaf Clint Barton, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff, Hurt Natasha, Hurt/Comfort, Languages and Linguistics, Natasha Needs a Hug, Protective Clint Barton, SPOILERS: CAPTAIN AMERICA 2, Spoilers, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-28
Updated: 2014-03-28
Packaged: 2018-01-17 07:07:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1378354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleSpider/pseuds/LittleSpider
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Natasha turns up at Clint's apartment, drenched in blood and needing to talk...<br/>But how can you talk when you're not sure who's listening...</p>
<p>WARNING: HAS SOME SPOILERS FROM CAPTAIN AMERICA 2. DO NOT READ IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO READ SPOILERS.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Without Words

**Author's Note:**

> LAST WARNING: THIS FIC CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR CAPTAIN AMERICA 2. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

**Without words**

Clint stood up, and took a sip of the beer from the brown, slightly chilled bottle and set it down beside the lamp that dimly illuminated the modest apartment.

He gazed around the very spartan living area and moved his gaze towards the window.

Lights. As far as the eye could see.

No point in getting a city apartment if it wasn’t on the top floor.

A view you couldn’t pay for…—yet he did.

Well, SHIELD did…

…Used to…

He stretched, felt a few knots slip out of place in his shoulders and headed towards the bedroom.

Not quite drunk, but comfortably unsober.

Scratching his back lazily, he passed the bathroom on his way to the bedroom when he heard a quiet, subdued, but unmistakable knock at his door.

…

He paused, his eyes fixed on the door, his consciousness elbowing and shoulder-bashing sleepy, tipsy thoughts from the front of his mind.

He looked at the digital display on the air con.

00:14am.

_A little late for girl scouts…_

Reaching into his boot, he pulled out a blade and moved quietly to the door, his footsteps soft and inaudible.

Looking through the spyhole, a groggy, familiar image moved into focus.

_Natasha_

Sighing he opened the door, putting his blade back in his boot.

“Na—”

The red head’s eyes were strained, her face pale and a bloody finger to her lips.

At once. Clint felt his lips still and close as he looked into her eyes. Eager to know where that blood had come from.

She held his gaze for a moment, until she knew he wasn’t going to speak and closed her eyes, taking a deep, yet shuddered breath before moving her hands into a motion…

Her hands were covered with—-blo…

_No…_

She was…she was signing the word _‘No’_

Why was Natasha signing?

Clint had been diagnosed as deaf at an early age following an ‘Accident’.

He ‘spoke’ Sign language fluently. Had done for a long time, and had found it useful in the field…

Sleepily, Clint touched his ears, noting he still had his aids in and quirked his head at her as if to say:

_'I can hear, dumbass'_

She shook her head impatiently, and her signing became more distressed, more frantic.

_'No talking. Ears everywhere'_ she signed.

His eyes moved from her blood soaked hands to her eyes as he nodded once, swallowing.

Natasha was paranoid.

_Paranoia has kept me alive, Barton. Perhaps you should try it._ She had laughed once as they ran through a bullet filled marketplace in Turkey.

…But this Paranoia wasn’t calm.

It was…panic.

It was panic on ice.

He pulled his hands from their fists at his side and forced out a few words.

_'Ears in apartment? I would know'_

_'Ears here.'_ she signed back. _'all of us'_

Clint swallowed and nodded once. Humouring her paranoia.

Hopefully, she’d start talking soon, they could wash that blood off her hands and she could get some sleep.

He nodded.

_‘Come in’_ he signed _‘Wash blood hands.’_

She looked relieved when she had interpreted it and walked in…

No…She was limping.

He held her by the shoulder and pulled back the hood that covered her face and most of her hair.

She was spattered with blood.

His lips parted again but she put her bloody hand over his mouth and shook her head. Her eyes were fraught with panic now. Her brow bathed with sweat.

This was serious.

He nodded and pulled her into the apartment as gently as she could before leading her to the couch.

She sat down, her eyes straying over every spare corner of the place. Looking for something.

He hadn’t seen her this rattled in years…

A good few years now.

He touched her chin gently to get her attention and gave her a sheepish smile

_'You tell me about this?'_

Her eyes watched his hands before moving to his face.

Her fingers moved again.

Clumsily, but still interpretable.

_'SHIELD fallen.'_ she began, clumsily making out the letters on her hand.

His fingers itched, desperate to speak, but he held still, waiting for her.

_‘My past on internet.’_ she fumbled over the word. _‘Enemies found me.’_

His eyes widened as she unzipped the jacket to reveal a bloody vest top, heavily saturated near her side.

He wasted no time in pulling the vest top up a little.

Her perfect skin was marred by red cuts and slices. Shrapnel wounds. From a blast.

He looked up into her eyes.

He made one word.

_‘How’_

She forced her hands to move again.

_'Car explosion. I ran. Not fast enough.'_

His eyes creased sympathetically.

_Oh Nat…_

He opened his arms and gently pulled her into a hug.

He wasn’t a medic, and knew there was no place she’d be safe right now, no hospital, no medical centre.

He’d need to find a way of getting her to Stark’s place. He’d hotwire his way into JARVIS if he had to to get her somewhere safe.

_…Oh Nat…._

_No…_

Her shoulders shook with a silent sob.

Stroking her hair gently her let her sob herself out onto his chest, feeling the cold blood soak into his own shirt.

He held onto her as tight as he dared, ready to let go the second she pulled away.

She cried out her own quiet misery into his shirt, and he knew she needed it.

He was in Afghanistan when SHIELD ‘fell’ and managed to get home safely, dodging any rogue HYDRA in his team.

He had made it avoiding detection or threat and had been waiting for Natasha to turn up on his doorstep as he lay low.

As soon as he saw her face on the news, he knew it was a matter of time before she came to him, her closet doors open, and the skeletons of her past on display for the entire world.

Natasha hid nothing from him, and there was nothing to fear.

All of her sin on display to the world and he didn’t care.

She pulled back, his arms released her instantly as she looked up at him, mascara clogging her lashes together.

He wiped her tear stained cheeks with his thumb and offered her a smile before sitting her upright.

_‘We clean you. We help you. STARK house’_ he signed. _‘STARK protect us.’_

Natasha’s eyes widened, her hands sprang up.

Clint held his finger up to still her.

_‘STARK protect us’_ he signed more definitely. _'Trust me.'_

She nodded and wiped her face, getting her resolve back.

Clint got up and moved towards the bathroom to get her a wet towel to try and clean herself, and her body up.

As soon as they got to Stark’s place, they’d be able to figure out how badly she needed treatment and what they could do with what they had.

Washing the purple towel under the faucet, something occurred to him.

Walking back to the living room, he handed her the towel and signed:

_'Why you come here?'_

She dabbed the towel to her side and screwed her eyes up tight, as if her skin was a red hot frying pan and the towel was ice.

He knelt down in front of her, to take it from her and to press at the wounds a little more evenly.

She looked down into his eyes and gave a crooked smile.

A splinter of the Natasha he knew.

The signs were a jumble, their phrasing confusing. But he knew what she meant.

_Who else would have me?_

He returned her smile and put his hand on her arm as he pressed harder against the wounds, she winced.

His thumb stroked her arm soothingly as he watched the colour return to her cheeks again.

They’d move on soon.

His quiver on his back, and her gun in her hand.

Wherever they ended up, now that the world had turned on its head.

He was sure, that while they were together, they’d be able to take it on.

She made a sign.

Her sign for him.

The one she had learned specifically for him.

The word for bird and eye blended into one.

His lip twitched as she used it and he raised his head to show he had seen it.

Her hand came from her chin in a precise movement.

_'Thank you'_

He nodded.

_'Anytime Red.'_


End file.
